Unchecked power and authority impact all of us; on both a visceral and physical level. Admittedly, I myself am engulfed with frustration and rage against those who spread the attitudes and lies that allow injustice to proliferate. Those whose inaction is validated by their misplaced sense of security. Security derived only from themselves not being the current target.

It is indeed true, that an injustice anywhere is an injustice everywhere. I am disappointed in the majority of our population in their failure to see such a truth. Disappointed in their failure to remember history. Disappointed in their failure to hold vigilant watch against any form of unruly government powers. And disappointed by how fervently they latch on to talking points, yet forget sound principles. They name the oppressed their enemy and have forgotten the true enemy.

I am not called a selfless person by many people, hardly anyone now that I think about it. So it is not out of “white saviorism”, “white guilt”, or selflessness  that I support the Black Lives Matter movement and others who share my desire for a more accountable, safe, prosperous, and just society. It is because of my own hatred for injustice and my own instinctive self preservation that I stand for any cause that seeks to eradicate the entities and practices that exist to the detriment of its people. It is because every time  I see  a person killed or brutalized by the state a piece of my soul dies. And  while the black man today… may be the  most likely and vulnerable victim of the state’s brutalities, he certainly is not the only victim..

White children, boys and girls, have been murdered in their sleep due to careless no knock raids. Unarmed, non threatening, and non violent Hispanic and white women have been killed, rendered to a vegetative state, had their teeth knocked out, and their skulls cracked by those who claim to serve and protect us. Young white men with bright futures have been killed, others put into a comas for infractions as innocuous as a broken taillight.  Acts as innocent as picking up ice-cream on a first date have ended in the execution of white men. It wasn’t long ago, the state awarded a 3 million dollar settlement to a white woman’s family after she was fatally shot 6 times in the head and neck by a plain clothed officer for improperly parking in a church parking lot.

While I do not say this to dismiss the undeniable and factually sustained claim that blacks are the ones who currently suffer most from an overbearing, inherently immoral,  and corrupt police state. The truth is, every year the police kill far more whites than any other race. Blacks are killed at a much higher rate, but because they are a much smaller percent of the population, they do not account for the majority of police killings.

So yes, police abuse and brutality should concern all of us. And yes, as it stands today, police abuse does have the most oppressive impact by far on the black community. This is why we should listen to the warnings of Niemöller, learn from mankind’s past mistakes,  and understand history teaches over and over, we will all ultimately be subject to whatever we tolerate. Such a poignant message is more critical now than ever before.

First they came for the Socialists, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a Socialist.

Then they came for the Trade Unionists, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a Trade Unionist.

Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a Jew.

Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me.

– Niemöller

Many refuse to acknowledge the horror inflicted upon our society’s most vulnerable, out of a fear of igniting a war on police. but even with the increase in tensions, officer fatalities have been at an all time low the past several years. And, as shown in statistics ranking professions by their risk of fatality,  as of 2016, it is significantly more dangerous to be a landscaper than a police officer.

The rhetoric is hype.

Used to scare us into placing justice in the backseat, and into accepting the oppression inflicted upon entire communities as a necessity for peace. To tell us silence is needed because the pursuit of justice would not be worth the cost. That justice should be sacrificed at the alter of peace. Yet, Christ taught wisdom must be pure before it can be peaceable.

When a man stands on the sound principles of human dignity, liberty, the right to privacy, the right to be secure in his own persons, government accountability, and the truth that we are all created in the image of God. Then the onus of changing for the sake of peace is on whoever stands against him. What value is a peace that survives only on  acquiescence to evil?

It was the same charge given by white plantation owners against those who sought to eradicate slavery.  To be labeled disruptive to the peace is a charge that will always be hurled toward anyone who stands for justice in an unjust world. Because where there is injustice there is the society in which it was established and tolerated. Where there is injustice there is the status quo and the system that sustains it